Innholdsfortegnelse for V. 1348 i The Week

What happened In a high stakes gamble, Boris Johnson this week set out plans for a £12bn-a-year tax rise to help fund health and social care. He conceded that the move broke a manifesto pledge, but said a “global pandemic was in no one’s manifesto”. The tax hike will start out as a 1.25 percentage point rise in national insurance (NI) payroll taxes from April 2022, and then be rebranded as a separate “health and social care levy” the following year. Unlike normal NI, the new levy will be paid by working pensioners. The same tax increase will apply to shareholder dividends. The plan – which angered many Tory MPs but was dismissed as a “sticking plaster” solution by Labour leader Keir Starmer – will increase Britain’s tax burden to…

“Is it safe to vaccinate healthy children? And, if so, should the Government get on with it?” These are the two “crucial questions” in the debate over giving schoolchildren the jab against Covid-19, said Paul Nuki and Sarah Newey in The Daily Telegraph. While countries such as France, Spain and the US have already pressed ahead with the policy, the UK’s Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI) finally gave its verdict last week – and it wasn’t very clear. On available evidence, the JCVI found that the health benefits of vaccinating healthy 12- to 15-year-olds “marginally” outweigh the risks. Yet, to government frustration, it refused to endorse a mass roll-out. Otherwise healthy children are very rarely hospitalised with Covid, it pointed out. And there remains “considerable uncertainty” about the…

Berlin Merkel weighs in: Angela Merkel has used what could be her final appearance before German MPs to lambast the finance minister of her own coalition government – the SPD’s Olaf Scholz. Germans will elect a new government in two weeks’ time, and polls show a surge in support for the Social Democrats and a slump for Merkel’s centre-right CDU. Voters appear to regard the dull-but-competent Scholz, who has been chosen to lead his party, as a more plausible heir to Merkel than her own party’s lacklustre candidate, Armin Laschet. The first postwar chancellor to step down of her own volition, Merkel has largely kept out of the campaign. But in her speech to MPs, she attacked Scholz as unstatesmanlike, pointing to the way he’d used the term “guinea pigs”…

For humanity’s sake, don’t glorify nature Simon Kuper Financial Times Many see it as a harmless fad, yet it must be one of the “most dangerous ideologies of our time”. I’m talking about “nature fetishism”, says Simon Kuper, the atavistic belief that all things “natural” are good, all things “unnatural” bad. Just think of the damage it causes – the deadly anti-vax movement, for a start. It’s also behind opposition to GM foods. Never mind that humanity has for time immemorial been genetically modifying animals and vegetables through selective breeding. Doing this in the lab to help feed starving millions and create new crops requiring fewer pesticides supposedly “goes against nature”. Nature fetishists have also turned the US, Germany and Japan against nuclear power, a remarkably safe technology that in…

Pollution linked to mental illness Exposure to airborne pollution may exacerbate mental health disorders, a study has found. Researchers gathered data on 13,800 patients who’d had contact with mental health services in south London between 2008 and 2012, and gauged the severity of their conditions by looking at how many appointments they’d had in the months and years after first presenting. They then compared this information with the levels of pollution around their home addresses. The results showed that a relatively small increase in levels of nitrogen dioxide (of 15μg/m³) was associated with an 18% increase in the risk of being admitted to hospital in a year, while higher levels of small particle pollution were associated with an 11% risk. Previous studies have found that people in more polluted areas…

Sir Anthony Hopkins recently revealed that he’d used an old actors’ trick to play Hannibal Lecter in The Silence of the Lambs: he didn’t blink. Now Michael Caine has admitted that early in his career, he tried it too. He had read about it in a book called Teach Yourself Film Acting, he recalls, which advised: “Don’t blink. You must never blink.’ For the next eight years, I walked around trying not to blink… People around me, my mother and everybody, thought I had gone nuts. They thought I was a psychopath.” Lee “Scratch” Perry, who has died aged 85, was a visionary record producer – and a loyal friend, too. In 1980, when Paul McCartney ended up in a Tokyo jail after being caught with marijuana, Perry sent a…

“Does reading classic literature have a beneficial effect on the criminal mind,” asked Amanda Craig in The Sunday Times. Judge Timothy Spencer QC apparently believes so. Last week, he gave Ben John, a former student at De Montfort University in Leicester who had downloaded some 70,000 white supremacist documents, including bomb-making guides, a two-year suspended sentence – telling the 21-year-old that he had avoided prison “by the skin of his teeth”. After making John promise not to read any more extremist material, Spencer asked him: “Have you read Dickens? Austen? Start with Pride and Prejudice and Dickens’s A Tale of Two Cities. Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night. Think about Hardy. Think about Trollope.” He promised to test John on these at his next hearing, and said that if he hadn’t read them,…

What a tournament this US Open is proving to be for teenagers, said Tumaini Carayol in The Guardian. We’ve seen Spain’s 18-year-old Carlos Alcaraz reach the men’s singles quarter-finals, and Canada’s Leylah Annie Fernandez, 19, reach the women’s semi-finals. Perhaps the most exciting prospect of all has been Emma Raducanu, said Jamie Johnson in The Daily Telegraph. The British teenager’s thrillingly attacking tennis and incessant running has got everyone talking about her. Deservedly so, said Simon Briggs in the same paper. Whatever the outcome of her quarter-final against Belinda Bencic (still to be played when The Week went to press), the 18-year-old has already proved beyond doubt she’s the real deal. Her rise has been meteoric: just three months ago, she was a “schoolgirl waiting for her A-level results and…

Selfish home owners To The Daily Telegraph I am no socialist, but nor am I enamoured of the selfish belief, held by the largely Tory-voting middle classes, that they have a right to hand their mostly unearned capital assets to their children. As is common now, rampant house-price inflation has left my wife and me with an over-valued home, in addition to our pensions and other assets. It cannot be right that the young, hard-working generations – who will never see such asset appreciation (even if they can get on to the housing ladder) and are unlikely to receive pensions as generous as ours – should have to fork out increased national insurance contributions, which we pensioners don’t pay, just so we can keep our homes. If we require long-term…

by Helena Merriman Hodder & Stoughton 336pp £20 The Week Bookshop £15.99 “It was a plan that seemed to defy not just caution but geography,” said Philip Oltermann in The Guardian. In the summer of 1962, a group of “daredevil diggers achieved the seemingly impossible”, and constructed a 135-metre tunnel under the Berlin Wall. Running between a factory in the West and a tenement block cellar in the East, the tunnel enabled 29 men, women and children to cross the Iron Curtain before it was discovered by the East German authorities. Over the years, the tunnel’s story has been “told and retold”, but in 2019, broadcaster and journalist Helena Merriman brought it to a new audience with a hugely popular ten-part BBC podcast series. Now she has turned that into…

A great police thriller must submit its protagonist to “a combination of hostility, indifference and jeopardy”, said Hugo Rifkind in The Times. The makers of Vigil achieved this at a stroke, by setting most of the action in a nuclear submarine. DCI Amy Silva (Suranne Jones) is the cop sent to investigate the death of a crew member aboard HMS Vigil, onequarter of the UK’s continuous at-sea deterrent, better known as Trident. As Commander Newsome (Paterson Joseph) makes plain, his priorities are keeping his mission on course and the rest of his crew alive, which means Silva is not a welcome presence. And Silva’s life is made yet more complicated when her colleagues uncover a political angle to the case, involving anti-nuclear activists. The series evolves into a “meaty” conspiracy…

The Tate’s “fake” Gauguin An unfinished painting in the Tate, long thought to have been the work of Paul Gauguin has been “downgraded as a fake”, says Martin Bailey in The Art Newspaper. First acquired from the art historian Roger Fry in 1917, Tahitians (c.1891) bears similarities to two other, as yet undisputed, Gauguin works, and its authenticity has never before been called into question; it was previously considered an important work for the fact it was unfinished, allowing scholars a rare opportunity to study the artist’s working methods. However, this may have been “misleading”: a definitive new catalogue raisonné – or inventory – of Gauguin’s works has omitted the painting. The publisher has not yet revealed why, but according to Gauguin researcher Fabrice Fourmanoir, the painting is unquestionably fake,…

Justin and Lilian want to invest in something they can do together. Lilian’s heart is set on an eventing horse, and she’s impatient for Jakob to do the pre-sale checks. Having heard Lilian recall her sailing days, Justin has organised a surprise trip to look at yachts on the Isle of Wight. With Jim away, Jazzer and Tracy spend time off together at Greenacres, and help Alistair look after a client’s dog, Mousse. At the vet practice, Jakob’s rudeness forces nurse Denise to quit. Nancy, the yacht broker Justin has arranged to meet, turns out to be an old acquaintance of Lilian’s and reveals a disastrous incident from her sailing past. Eventually, Lilian admits she doesn’t like sailing at all. Without Denise, things are fraught and chaotic at the practice.…

Cauliflower couscous 1 jasmine teabag 30g sultanas 250g cauliflower, chopped 5 tbsp mixed nuts and seeds (pine nuts, pistachios or poppy seeds) 1 tbsp chopped dill 1 tbsp chopped lovage or parsley leaves 1 tbsp chopped mint leaves 30g olive oil finely grated zest and juice of ½ a lemon seeds of 1 pomegranate 40g red grapes, halved ½ a garlic clove, minced fine sea salt to assemble: labne dukkah • Make a cup of tea with the jasmine teabag and add the sultanas. Leave to soak for a couple of hours ideally, though at least while you prepare the other ingredients. • Blend the cauliflower in a processor until it resembles couscous. Transfer to a mixing bowl and season lightly with salt. • Toast the nuts and seeds in…

• Even dogs that pre-existed the pandemic may be distressed when their owners go back out to work. It will be much easier if you get them used to being left at home alone well in advance. • The dog needs to learn that if you go out, you will come back. Start gradually. Go out for a minute. Come back in, and give the dog a quick hello. Don’t make a fuss, even if it does. You want to convey the sense that your absence is normal. • Do this several times a day, staying out a bit longer every day. • Look for signs of separation anxiety. If you have a home camera, you can see if the dog is walking up and down, or scrabbling at or…

Sarah Harding 1981-2021 In 2002, thousands of young hopefuls auditioned for the ITV reality show Popstars: The Rivals. But when Sarah Harding appeared in front of the judges in August that year, it took them no time to see her potential. She hadn’t even finished the first verse of her chosen song when Pete Waterman told her: “You’re through, you’re going to London.” Four months later, viewers voted the 20-year-old into the newly created girl band Girls Aloud. Girls Aloud was “formed to fill the gap in the market left by the break-up of the Spice Girls”, and superseded them by having “a record-breaking run of 20 consecutive Top 10 singles”, said The Times, four of which reached No. 1. Six of their albums went platinum. By the time they…

Major stock markets globally continued to make gains. The US Nasdaq and S&P 500 indices reached new all-time highs: the latter has now chalked up one of its longest-ever winning streaks, rising to more than double the lows reached in March 2020. European stocks are also on a roll. The Stoxx 600 European equity index rose by 2% in August – its seventh consecutive month of gains. Japan’s Topix benchmark hit a 30-year high. The price of bitcoin tumbled after its botched debut as legal tender in El Salvador. Aluminium prices hit a ten-year high following a coup in Guinea, a key source of the metal’s raw material, bauxite. The UK Government ran into a storm of protest from business groups protesting the proposed NI hike and a surprise tax…

El Salvador’s bid to become the first country to adopt bitcoin as legal tender “got off to a bumpy start” on Tuesday due to technical difficulties, reported The Wall Street Journal. Overloaded servers forced the government to take its “e-wallet”, Chivo, offline for several hours. Bitcoin enthusiasts around the world “showed their support” for what they called “B-Day” by each buying $30 of bitcoin. But the currency still tumbled, falling by almost 14% to around $45,000 as of Wednesday morning – and taking rivals XRP Ripple, Ethereum and Cardano with it, said Liv McMahon in The Scotsman. The overall market suffered “a $400bn wipeout”. Until that setback, “major crypto tokens” were on something of a roll, noted Quartz: “trading at their highest level since May”. Crypto prices “tend to ping-pong…

The week’s best shares B&M European Value Retail The Times The groceries-to-garden furniture retailer has a good chance of maintaining fat margins amid rising costs, thanks to its “narrow but deep” buying strategy. Highly cash-generative with a potential 3.7% yield. Buy. 540p. CRH Investors Chronicle The building materials giant offers a balance of geographic diversification, a resilient repair and improvements market, and high margin infrastructure work. An excellent cash generator and strongly profitable. Buy. £38.02. Macfarlane Group Investors Chronicle The packager, whose clients vary from Siemens to Asos and Dunelm, is making hay from a growing e-commerce sector. A strong track record of 11 years’ profit growth provides solid footings for its “buy and build” strategy. Buy. 135p. Redx Pharma The Sunday Times Revenues at this specialist cancer and fibrosis…

What happened The Taliban formalised its grip on power this week, announcing an interim government and declaring Afghanistan an “Islamic Emirate”. Led by Mullah Mohammad Hassan Akhund, foreign minister under the previous Taliban regime, the new cabinet includes the leader of the Haqqani Network terror group, Sirajuddin Haqqani, who will serve as interior minister. Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid – who had promised an “inclusive” regime – sought to allay concerns about the presence of hardliners, insisting the cabinet was “not complete, it is just acting”. The news came after the Taliban claimed victory over rebel forces in the Panjshir Valley northeast of Kabul – the last stronghold of opposition, thereby completing its takeover. Back in the capital, hundreds of people took to the streets to denounce the Taliban and to…

There are few upsides to the pandemic, but Radio 3 presenter Petroc Trelawny has found one: fewer people coughing unnecessarily in concert halls and theatres. “Most of us seldom need to indulge in a gentle bout of rasping, but when others start, it’s human nature to follow along,” he says. But now coughing has a new stigma attached to it. “It has become the equivalent of randomly shouting, ‘Fire!’ in a theatre – a gesture guaranteed to provoke fear.” The success of the TV series The Queen’s Gambit, and repeated lockdowns, have led to a global shortage of chess sets, and a surge in the number of people playing the game online. Chess.com has 72 million members, up from 50 million in December.…

Back in the 1990s, Germany’s social care system was, like the UK’s today, in deep trouble. In response, the German government introduced a new funding model supported by both main political parties. The entire workforce puts in 1.5% of their salaries into a fund, and that sum is matched by employers. And although wealthier people are expected to top up government contributions with their own money, they’re not expected to pay the whole cost of care. The result is an insurance-based system where a similar level of care is provided throughout the country, and is determined by people’s needs, rather than their ability to pay. More comprehensive still is the model in Japan, home to one of the world’s oldest populations. It requires everyone over 40 to pay into a…

Scientists have added ducks to the list of animals which can, like parrots, learn to mimic humans – after finding a recording of an Australian duck that shouted the phrase “You bloody fool!” during mating. Ripper, a male musk duck that was hand-reared at Tidbinbilla Nature Reserve, was recorded in 1987 using a phrase that he had apparently learnt from his keeper. The recording also features musk ducks making a noise like a car door slamming. An Italian pastry chef has decided to live like a hobbit to fulfil his passion for The Lord of the Rings. Nicolas Gentile, 37, bought some land near Chieti in Abruzzo to build his own personal Shire, where he lives and where his friends join him in costume for festivals. He even assembled a…

Is Russia poised to “fill the vacuum” left by the US’s chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan? “Don’t be so sure,” says Paul Stronski. Despite the “bombast and gloating” of Kremlin propagandists, more “sober-minded” officials are anxious about the “combustible” situation to the country’s south. They fear the Taliban’s resurgence could lead to the spread of religious fundamentalism in Russia’s Central Asian sphere of influence, and “shake up the region’s balance of power”. Worse, officials worry that armed extremists might join the flood of refugees fleeing Afghanistan, and that Islamic State or other groups could exploit the chaos to launch attacks on Russia itself. Another concern is that the drug trade will receive a boost – most of Russia’s heroin comes from Afghanistan – creating a “major public health problem”. The Kremlin…

When Vesuvius erupted in AD79, hundreds of people in Herculaneum rushed to the waterfront and huddled in boathouses along it – where they were killed by a sudden blast of ash and gas that burnt their flesh but preserved their bones. Nearly two millennia on, an analysis of the ratio of carbon and nitrogen isotopes in amino acids in the bones of 17 of these Romans has provided archaeologists with an unusually clear picture of the local diet at that time. And it contains some surprises. For instance, the villagers positively guzzled fish: they ate 70 types of fish found in the Bay of Naples and derived a quarter of their protein from the sea – nearly triple the amount in the modern Mediterranean diet. However, the men derived 50%…

The Commons investigation last week into why Britain was “caught unawares” in Afghanistan did one very useful thing, said Nick Cohen in The Spectator. It exposed “the collapse in standards of ministerial competence” better than any inquiry I have seen. The demonstration by Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab “of what he did not know” was “almost awe-inspiring”. Tom Tugendhat MP, chairman of the Foreign Affairs Select Committee, asked Raab how he had responded to a government risk report from 22 July, which warned that rapid Taliban advances could trigger a political and humanitarian crisis. Raab could only say that he had been “mindful” of its contents. Asked when he’d last updated the evacuation order for Afghanistan, which would have helped civilians to get out, he didn’t know. How many British citizens…

The last time they performed together, Britain had just won the Falklands War, said Robert Hardman in the Daily Mail. But now, after surely the longest hiatus in pop history, “Abba are BACK”. The Swedish supergroup announced last week that they had recorded ten new tracks for their first album in 40 years. What’s more, they’ll soon be back on stage too, albeit in a virtual form. From next May, digital avatars, or “Abba-tars”, of the foursome in their youthful prime will be performing concerts in a purpose-built arena in east London, with the help of a live band and holographic technology developed by George Lucas’s special-effects company. Forgive me if I don’t cheer this news, said Rod Liddle in The Sunday Times. The 1970s was a great decade for…

The final day of the fourth Test began with England and their supporters “daring to dream”, said Ali Martin in The Guardian. At the start of play, Joe Root’s side were 77 without loss, requiring another 291 to overhaul India. Such a total was clearly a tall order – England have never chased more than 315 to win a Test match – but it still seemed just possible, given the placid nature of the Oval pitch. Yet the optimists reckoned without India’s star pace bowler, Jasprit Bumrah, who proved the critical difference, said Mike Atherton in The Times. In a superb sixover spell after lunch, he deployed the rarefied art of reverse swing with a “skill and versatility” that recalled the great Pakistani bowlers of the 1990s. In consecutive overs,…

To the Financial Times Even as a staunch Remainer, I long ago came to the conclusion that there was a convenient conspiracy of silence about low wages for UK farm workers, truckers, food processors and abattoir staff (“Kwasi Kwarteng call to hire UK workers”). Those who had bought into this cosy scenario included their employers, consumers and supermarket chains. So what to do? Food prices will have to rise, and people had better get used to it. Sorry, but the British public and farmers voted for this outcome, abetted by the National Farmers’ Union who sat on the fence throughout the referendum. You reap what you sow. Alan Bullion, Tunbridge Wells, Kent To the Financial Times I am not sure what point Alan Bullion is making. It is fashionable to…

by Richard Beard Harvill Secker 288pp £16.99 The Week Bookshop £13.99 I cannot recall reading an angrier book than this “cathartic denunciation of the private boarding school system”, said Nicholas Lezard in The Spectator. The novelist Richard Beard, who was “sent away” to boarding school aged eight, is convinced that the experience irreparably “damaged and twisted him”. His rage, however, is more than just personal: he’s also appalled at what “damaged children” like Boris Johnson and David Cameron have done to the entire country. While many ex-public school pupils won’t accept his arguments, I found this a genuinely “eye-opening” book – and “one of the finest polemics I have ever come across”. Nonsense, said David James in The Times. Sad Little Men is a “strange, self-indulgent primal scream of a…

Netflix’s charming new series The Chair has brought a venerable genre – the campus drama – back to our screens. Here are five of the best cinematic examples: National Lampoon’s Animal House This frathouse romp became the highest grossing comedy ever on its release in 1978. It is uproariously vulgar, sharply satirical, and features one of John Belushi’s most memorable performances. However, some of the jokes have not aged well, and are likely to strike a discordant note with modern audiences. Educating Rita Julie Walters plays a working-class hairdresser who enrols in an Open University literature course in an effort to improve herself. Co-starring Michael Caine as the alcoholic professor assigned to be her tutor. Lewis Gilbert’s 1983 film (adapted by Willy Russell from his own play) looks a bit…

DREWATTS EST. 1759 A private collection of rare pianos dating from the 18th century to present day. Personally selected by David Winston, collector, maker and Restorer and Conservator of Pianos to Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II. AUCTION DATE Thursday 23 September 2021 AUCTION LOCATION Dreweatts, Donnington Priory, Newbury, Berkshire RG14 2JE VIEWING BY APPOINTMENT FROM 6 SEPTEMBER Period Piano Company, Park Farm Oast, Frittenden Road, Biddenden, Kent TN27 8LG ENQUIRIES +44 (0) 1635 553 553 | housesales@dreweatts.com Catalogue and free online bidding: dreweatts.com…

The Rupert Annual (Farshore £10.99). This was the first thing that got me interested in reading as a kid. There were three speeds at which you could read it: the synopsis at the top, a rhyming couplet under each of the beautiful illustrations, and the text. It’s the only childhood memory I have, actually. Rupert bestrides my waning memory bank like a colossus. Tales of Mystery and Imagination by Edgar Allan Poe, 1839 (Wordsworth £2.99). My introduction to the work of Poe was via early 1960s movies directed by Roger Corman and featuring Vincent Price, including my favourite: House of Usher. Nobody writes like him. Against Nature by Joris-Karl Huysmans, 1884 (Penguin £9.99). I grew up in the inner city and always felt like a fish out of water in…

Programmes Inside America’s Treasure House: The Met Three-part series looking behind the scenes of New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art. Mon 13 Sep, BBC4 21:00 (60mins). Spice Girls: How Girl Power Changed Britain Twenty-five years since the release of their debut single, this series charts the evolution of the girl band. Tue 14 Sept, C4 21:00 (60mins). The Man Putin Couldn’t Kill Documentary about the poisoning of the opposition leader Alexei Navalny. Wed 15 Sept, C4 22:00 (90mins). Patrick Kielty: One Hundred Years of Union The comedian, whose father was killed in the Troubles, looks at Northern Ireland’s future. Thur 16 Sept, BBC1 21:00 (60mins). Help Jodie Comer and Stephen Graham star in this moving drama about a young care-home worker and her early-onset Alzheimer’s patient struggling in lockdown. Thur 16…

Unless you’ve been hiding under a rock, you’ll have heard about the “wellness” ingredient CBD (or cannabidiol), says Jack Rear in The Daily Telegraph. A compound found in the cannabis plant, CBD, unlike THC, isn’t psychoactive – it won’t make you “high” – but proponents claim it has many benefits, including relieving anxiety and muscle pain, and even promoting weight loss. Health shops are full of CBD oils and supplements – and now CBD drinks are becoming a thing too: people say they make them feel more relaxed, less anxious. Given the substance’s naturally bitter taste, it’s a challenge to make the drinks palatable without stuffing them full of sugar; the best products I tried did this by working round the bitter taste, rather than trying to disguise it. Of…

Adnams Ghost Ship 0.5% is a low-alcohol version of its popular pale ale: it’s unusual in that it is created by filtering out the alcohol, rather than by delaying fermentation (500ml for £1.30; Morrisons). The Big Drop Paradiso Citra IPA is what you’d expect from an IPA – tangy, hoppy and complex. It’s got a distinct citrusy, tropical aroma and it’s gluten-reduced (330ml for £1.50, or 4 for £4; Ocado). After brewing, Lucky Saint Unfiltered Lager is conditioned for 42 days, which means that sediment doesn’t need filtering. The end result is a thick head and creamy consistency (330ml for £1.80; Sainsbury’s). Brooklyn Special Effects is a bitter lager with an intense aroma. It uses Caramel and Munich malts and it’s dry hopped with the American Mosaic, Citra and Amarillo…

KPMG/EY: persistent stains There’s nothing like getting back to work with a clean slate. Sadly, for Big Four bean-counters KPMG and EY, some stubborn stains relating to past failures seem impervious to scrubbing. KPMG is still in the cross hairs of UK regulators over its audits of Carillion (the giant contractor that collapsed in 2018) and another outsourcer, Regenersis, said Tom Howard in The Times. The firm now faces “a disciplinary tribunal” for allegedly supplying the Financial Reporting Council “with false and misleading information”. EY’s woes date back even further, said Sam Jones in the FT. The firm’s Swiss practice is being sued for $1bn by the US hedge fund Lion Point Capital, in connection with the 2010 collapse of Zeromax – an opaque Uzbek conglomerate with a “labyrinthine network…

A kick in the teeth for business Philip Aldrick The Times As might be anticipated, the business reaction to the new health and social care levy hasn’t been entirely positive, says Philip Aldrick. Business groups “rounded on the Government” over its plans to raise national insurance contributions (NICs) by 1.25% on both employee and employer – a move that will lift “the tax on employment” from 22.7% to 24.6% at the worst possible time. Given the ending of the furlough scheme next month, companies – many burdened with pandemic debts – already faced “difficult decisions”. The new levy now threatens to be “a drag anchor on jobs growth”, says the British Chambers of Commerce. Still, at least the NICs move was expected. The accompanying 1.25% tax hike on company dividends…

A woman tracked down two young men who saved her son from drowning, so that she could thank them. Frankie Creek, 7, fell off a jetty at Caldecotte Lake in Milton Keynes last month. His mother didn’t notice him fall in, but brothers Kofi and Jermaine Reid did, and raced to his rescue. She was too shaken to talk to them at the scene, and couldn’t find them later – so she put out an appeal on social media. “We still have our son because of their quick actions,” she said. The thriving seal population in the Thames estuary is proof the river is “full of life”, according to a new report. The latest count, taken in August, turned up 2,866 grey seals and 797 harbour seals, said researchers from…

Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab now has a net approval rating among Conservative members of just 6%, down from 73% last month. The figure puts him 24th (out of 27) in a league table of Cabinet ministers; before the withdrawal from Afghanistan, he was ranked third. In the same period, Defence Secretary Ben Wallace has climbed from ninth position to fourth. Education Secretary Gavin Williamson has the lowest approval ratings, at -53. Conservative Home/Daily Mail 48% of Conservative voters and 47% of Leave voters say they’d never consider occasionally swapping meat in their diets for plant-based proteins. 28% of Labour voters and 29% of Remainers say the same. YouGov/The Times…

Racism and the rebel tours A lynchpin of the West Indies team that dominated cricket in the 1970s and 1980s, Michael Holding is one of the greatest fast bowlers of all time, said Murad Ahmed in the FT. Now, though, he is becoming better known for his discourse on racism. Last year, he delivered an off-the-cuff speech on Sky Sports about the roots of Black Lives Matter that went viral. In it, he mentioned that as a young man growing up in Jamaica, he did not experience much racism firsthand; but he was confronted with it in his playing career. In the 1980s, he rejected huge sums to join other West Indies players on “rebel tours” of South Africa in defiance of the global boycott of the apartheid regime. The…

Faslane, Dunbartonshire Trident plans: Britain’s Trident nuclear submarine base could be moved from the west coast of Scotland to the US or France if Scotland gains its independence, according to leaked government contingency plans. The UK’s four nuclear subs are currently based at HMNB Clyde, in Faslane and Coulport. However, the SNP opposes Trident’s renewal and has pledged that it would ban all nuclear weapons from an independent Scotland. Moving the subs to bases in allied nations is one of a range of options that officials have considered. Another would be to relocate them to the Royal Navy’s Devonport base, but this could cost as much as £4bn. A third would involve negotiating long leases for their present site – effectively creating a British territory within an independent Scotland. However,…

For those Africans used to seeing their presidents ruling almost in perpetuity, the recent handover of power in Zambia was a “bewildering” experience, says Jenerali Ulimwengu. President Edgar Lungu had been in office for six years when Zambians went to the polls last month, and did his best to stay in power by trying to rig the election. But voters weren’t having it: they decisively gave him the boot, backing opposition leader Hakainde Hichilema instead. It’s the third time they’ve changed their government democratically in as many decades – a remarkable feat on a continent where “some very old and tired people preside over old and tired political systems”. So what’s their secret? Zambia’s founding president Kenneth Kaunda set an example in 1991 by agreeing to multi-party elections and then…

The number of organ transplants carried out in the UK fell by almost a third last year because of the pressure on hospitals during the pandemic. Owing to their highly invasive nature, transplants carry a high risk of infection, and patients need a long period in hospital to recover. When resources had to be diverted to cope with an influx of Covid patients, hundreds of operations were delayed or cancelled. In the spring of 2020, fewer than seven transplants were being carried out each day, down from 25 to 30 a day in 2019. In total, 1,298 fewer transplants were done in 2020 than 2019. Overall, 487 patients died waiting for a transplant compared with 372 the year before. The figures come from an international study of 22 countries, which…

Twenty years ago, the 9/11 attacks “catapulted the US and the UK” into an intense “security partnership”, said Peter Ricketts in The Guardian. The first world leader to visit Ground Zero, Tony Blair promised that Britain would “stand shoulder to shoulder” with the US; and the UK duly became a lead nation for the Nato mission in Afghanistan, triggered by the US and its allies invoking Article 5 of its founding treaty (the principle that an attack on one is an attack on all) for the first time in the alliance’s history. In the next two decades, the UK provided the largest number of troops after the US, and suffered the second-largest number of combat deaths. Yet when President Biden began his withdrawal of US troops last month, none of…

“One should never lose one’s sense of the superficial.”Lord Northcliffe, quoted in The Independent “When men get ahead, that’s the natural course of things. But when a woman succeeds in politics, then you’ll find assassinated men lying all along the wayside of her route to power.”Angela Merkel, quoted in The Sunday Times “There are no solutions; there are only trade-offs.”American economist Thomas Sowell, quoted in The Times “It’s better to be quotable than to be honest.”Tom Stoppard, quoted in Forbes “You could never convince a monkey to give you a banana by promising him limitless bananas after death in monkey heaven.”Yuval Noah Harari, quoted on The Conversation “Flowers are restful to look at. They have neither emotions nor conflicts.”Sigmund Freud, quoted on The Browser “When it comes down to it,…

Of all the British Paralympians who excelled in Tokyo – where Team GB finished second behind China in the medals table – the most remarkable has to be Sarah Storey, said Paul MacInnes in The Guardian. Last week, the 43-year-old cyclist became “the most successful British Paralympian of all time” when she earned the 17th gold medal of her career by defending her women’s C4-5 road race title. Storey, who was born with a malformed left hand, didn’t even start out as a cyclist, said Katie Falkingham on BBC Sport: she was a “14-year-old swimmer” when she made her Paralympic debut 29 years ago. Having won five golds in the pool, she transitioned to cycling in the mid-2000s, because of persistent ear infections. Storey’s achievements are “off-the-scale extraordinary”, said Jenny…

“You wait Covid-protracted ages for a dash of Disney stage-magic and all at once you get a meteor-shower’s worth,” said Dominic Cavendish in The Daily Telegraph. Richard Eyre’s magical Mary Poppins is back in the West End. The long-awaited Frozen is in previews at Drury Lane. And out on the road, crisscrossing the UK until May 2022, is this sumptuous stage version of Bedknobs and Broomsticks, the much-loved 1971 film musical starring Angela Lansbury. Right from the “bravura” opening scene, the show’s a “triumph”, said Gary Naylor on The Arts Desk. Children will be dazzled by the magnificent illusions and effects; parents will enjoy the glitzy costumes and design, and “everyone will marvel at the extraordinarily expressive puppets”. Big touring shows like this often promise much but fail to deliver,…

Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings Dir: Destin Daniel Cretton (2hrs 12mins) (12A) We’re always being told that the latest superhero movie is a stand-out of the genre – but this new one from the Marvel canon really is a “blast”, said Tim Robey in The Daily Telegraph. The Canadian martial artist Simu Liu – Marvel’s first Asian film lead – plays Shaun, a genial San Francisco parking valet whose friendship with co-worker Katy (the actress and rapper Awkwafina) creates some sparky slacker comedy in the opening scenes. Then, a crew of tough guys corner the pair on a bus, and we discover that Shaun is really Shang-Chi, the estranged son of The Mandarin (Tony Leung Chiu Wai), a 1,000-year-old Chinese warlord bent on stealing Shang-Chi’s magic pendant.…

The end of the al fresco summer Soho’s experiment with road-based dining is soon to end, said Jimmy Nsubuga in Metro. At the start of summer, several streets in the area were closed to traffic in the evening, to enable restaurants and cafés to expand their dining areas. Intended to make it easier for pandemic-hit venues to accommodate customers, the measures were replicated across the UK, sparking talk of a continental-style “al fresco dining culture” taking hold. But in Soho at least, that won’t be happening: traffic is to be reintroduced on 30 September. Councillors in Westminster took the decision primarily to appease “hacked-off residents”, who’ve persistently complained about extra noise and nuisance, said Charlotte Lytton in The Daily Telegraph. Their complaints may be valid, but it feels short-sighted of…

With its latest wearable, Samsung is kickstarting a new era of Android tech, said The Independent. Thus far, while iPhone users have been able to invest in the “do-it-all wearable that is the Apple Watch”, owners of Android phones have been “half-served” by a disjointed range of Fitbits, Fossils and Garmins. Now, though, Samsung has teamed up with Google to make its first Android smartwatch. This is a best of both worlds deal: as the watch runs on Google’s superior Wear OS software (as opposed to Samsung’s Tizen system), you get access to all the Google Play apps and functionality you need, on a “sophisticated-looking device that’s a joy to use and comfortable to wear around the clock”. Samsung’s previous smartwatches have scored well on compatibility, said Tech Radar. So…

Lee “Scratch” Perry 1936-2021 Lee “Scratch” Perry was an eccentric Jamaican record producer who “revelled in disorder”, said The Daily Telegraph. In his tiny Black Ark studio in Kingston, he would whirl like a dervish around his mixing desk, dressed in shorts and a singlet, often barefoot – and almost always stoned. Yet the sounds he created, as a pioneer of both roots reggae and dub, reverberated around the world. His recording technique involved laying down the drum and bass, and only when he was satisfied with the rhythm would he add the lyrics. Dub, or “version”, emerged when he started re-recording tracks using even heavier, slower basslines, with extensive echo, reverb and sampled lyrics, to create a spooky, almost sinister effect. “The bass is the brain and the drum…

What is a hotel without clean sheets? Prepare to find out, said James Tapsfield on MailOnline. The latest casualty of Britain’s chronic staff shortages and logistics chaos is the laundry trade, which is struggling “to keep pace with demand”, even as the staycation boom eases. InterContinental Hotels Group, owner of Holiday Inn and Crowne Plaza hotels, is among several chains “trimming services”. Indeed, some managers report that staff are washing linen at home because frazzled laundry providers cannot guarantee delivery. The situation is “bloody horrific”, said Daniel Browne, owner of Blossom & Browne’s Sycamore, which provides laundry for many London hotels. There’s no respite in sight, according to employers’ groups. CBI boss Tony Danker has warned that the UK’s “acute skills shortage” will extend into more industries and could last…

• Nuclear rumble The Government is currently setting new rules “on how to define environmentally friendly investments” – in an effort to ensure that the billions of pounds flowing towards the sector are not diverted to “dirty” projects, said Rachel Millard in The Daily Telegraph. The creation of the “Green Taxonomy” (as the new rules are called) is proving a fractious business, particularly on the subject of nuclear energy. The industry argues it’s impossible to meet the national target of zero carbon emissions by 2050 without nuclear. Opponents point to environmentally-unfriendly factors like hazardous waste and “the remote but catastrophic” risk of accidents. Since the Government is now trumpeting “strong evidence to support nuclear energy’s inclusion”, it seems the industry has won. • Green gilts… Later this month, the UK’s…

Hui Ka Yan The founder of one of China’s “most systemically important businesses”, property group Evergrande, was photographed in July attending the Communist Party’s 100-year anniversary celebrations in Tiananmen Square, says the FT. For those in the know, that was an alarm bell. That Hui received an invitation means he is on President Xi Jinping’s “radar”, noted researchers at Cercius – “which is usually not a good thing”. So it has proved. Last month, regulators “publicly rebuked” Hui over the need to cut Evergrande’s $89bn debt. Many in the bond markets now believe his self-made empire is “teetering on the brink of disaster”. Hui’s woes coincide with a wider crackdown on China’s tycoons in what Xi has dubbed his push for “common prosperity”. Martin Gilbert Would the real Martin Gilbert…

THE WEEK CROSSWORD 1277 An Ettinger travel pass case and two Connell Guides will be given to the sender of the first correct solution to the crossword and the clue of the week opened on Monday 20 September. Email the answers as a scan of a completed grid or a list, with the subject line The Week crossword 1277, to crossword@theweek.co.uk. Tim Moorey (timmoorey.com) This week’s winner will receive an Ettinger (ettinger.co.uk) travel pass case (assorted colours), which retails at £105, and two Connell Guides connellguides.com). ACROSS 1 Worldly posh girl concealing fling (6) 5 Rail cut off in dock (7) 10 What’s put up as stuff comes down and gets left behind! (8) 11 Football team saving time for issues (6) 12 Spoken against dictionary in small rooms (12)…